Carrion Crown Chapter 4, Wake of the Watcher, Session 1

First Session (17 page pdf) – Slugs and babynapping cultists abound in the otherwise-shitty town of Illmarsh. But we obtain the ultimate weapon – a controlled spectre!

We continue to peel back the layers of decrepitude in the town, where it’s pretty clear they’re pimping out babies to Deep Ones. I like Jayleen the local barkeep though, she’s fun. A giant octopus goes after a local, we kill it, as we are wont to do.

Then it’s out to Undiomede House, an old ruined mansion, since everything about its appearance in local lore cries out “conveniently close to town dungeon location.” Turns out the trip there is more unhealthy than a Perfect Bacon Bowl, as leeches overtake us – and not just normal leeches, burrow-to-your-brain in three rounds leeches. They are a “hazard” not monsters so of course we butt up against the game rules as we try to get them off us. I manage it but Nigel, Oswald, and Zurax all get brain parasites for their trouble!

We save a baby from some ridiculously-dressed cultists, which puts an abrupt end to the dungeoning! We head back and try to get someone that won’t eat/trade the kid so we can go back. And we kill another even more ridiculously dressed cultist! Fade to black.

The whole Deep One cultist thing is a bit obvious in this chapter but my group did run into a few surprises; I don’t know how much of that was the GM or the original adventure so I won’t say more just yet.

I did like the exploding squid head monsters. It made for suitable horrific imagery — with elements of Resident Evil 4 — and the parasitic life cycle meant that they were interesting and dangerous beyond simply punching their opponents to death.